


Jealous gods

by Vesperchan



Series: Tumblr Shorts [7]
Category: Naruto
Genre: AU, BAMF Sakura, Based on a Tumblr Post, Dark gods, Dark kakashi, Dishonored 2, F/M, If you squint you can see the DnD references, Revenge Sakura, Sakura with powers, Surprise Ending, This Is Not Going To Go The Way You Think, Tumblr Prompt, Tumblr made me do it, Yandere, alternative endings?, dark itachi, posessive lover
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-14
Updated: 2019-03-19
Packaged: 2019-11-17 21:38:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 15,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18106970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vesperchan/pseuds/Vesperchan
Summary: When a coup takes the lives of the king and the rest of the royal family, Sakura, the sole surviver, escapes to the edge of the world with Kakashi to strike a bargain with an old god. Her worship in exchange for his power. She's warned he's a dark and jealous god, but that's not enough to sway her.“Let me wear your name like a kiss on my throat, let me roam the world with the freedom of your patronage. The earth is your alter and I am the incense that beckons you here. Make me new."





	1. Make Me New

When Sakura first struck her bargain with the god from the void her last and most loyal retainer warned her once and only once. Kakashi knew as well as any other empire citizen that she was as good as dead any other way. They might as well be on the run with the noose from their hanging ropes trailing behind them, draped like jewelry around their necks. 

“He’s a dark god, my dear. Don’t make the mistake of thinking him as capable of kindness as any mortal man.”

“I don’t,” Sakura answered easily. 

Kakashi swallowed down the rest of his complains. He knew better. No one had been closer, no one more faithful or more loyal than the old hound master. He had lost everything when he ran with her, when he saved her from the execution that left the rest of her family wearing red stains around their necks and little else.  

Over a hundred corpses later, they were at the edge of the known world, tasting salt in the air as it crashed with the waves against the black cliffs. Neither knew how much longer they would be able to evade their pursuers. If the masked guard didn’t kill them on the road, the elements of the _godwilds_ would. It was worse than being stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Sakura chuckled and tried to play off her decision like something silly. “Who’s to say this will even work. Don’t you have to be interesting to win such favor?”

“You’ll not have any reason for concern should you make this choice,” Kakashi sighed. “You’re the heir of a slaughtered house, the niece to the usurper king and the daughter of the fallen emperor. What wild god wouldn’t want a boon with you? Even objectively speaking, you have to see that for yourself.”

“Then there’s no use in putting it off any longer.” 

Sakura stood and passed Kakashi to where the slanted doorway hung half open, too warped to close all the way. She pushed it aside and stepped out onto the deck of the ancient ship moored on the rocks. It was broken into quarters that existed in various forms of decay. She heard Kakashi at the door but waved a hand over her shoulder, signaling him to stay behind.

It would be bad if he got caught up in her own heresy. 

Sakura pulled the sealing stone from her coat pocket and then set it down before placing a scrimshaw icon of a the Mother beside it. There were more pockets on her coat she pat down for the rest of her offering. The last of her food, her mother’s pearls, blood from a cut on her hand, and then her own tears.

The sky was a dark sort of gray overhead and when the wind blew it cut through her. Silence stretched on and Sakura took one last deep breath before screaming as high and long as she could. She shredded her voice for that desperate note begging for attention. Her voice pitched high, held, and then fell with a tumble into her summoning song. She broke off her bonds with the rest of the world and made herself the final offering.

“Let me wear your name like a kiss on my throat, let me roam the world with the freedom of your patronage. The earth is your alter and I am the incense that beckons you here. Make me new. Make me the thing that cleans your feet with my hair and weeping. Make me your chosen, god from the void.”

Then she spoke his name and the sky split open. 

When she opened her eyes again the wreck of the clipper ship was gone. The sky wasn’t sky anymore. She turned and saw more of the new world for what it really was, but only grew more confused. Dark whale fish drifted through the sky, cutting through black clouds and then dipping low through them, out of view. Fragments of black rock drifted through the air without concern for the laws of gravity. Shards broke off and drifted back together, some like driftwood caught in the waves on the shore, others like the outer edges of a lung’s breath. 

Sakura stepped forward, testing the surface under her shoes, daring one more step before stopping again. She was in another being’s world- that much was apparent. But where was her host?

“Someone should have warned you about me.”

Sakura turned around once more and saw the broken hull of a far older ship. The dark god lounged off the edge, black cloak tails dripping into gray mist at the edges. Like the stories said, he was pale and beautiful with the darkest eyes and hair just as black.The front of his cloak sagged open and showed off the upper portion of his chest where a single leather cord rested with his icon dangling at the end. Sakura wore a similar icon under her own tunic and in his world it burned against her skin.

“I’ve never been good at listening to others.”

“Apparently. You’re at the edge of the world. This is no place for you.”

“That’s why I sought you out, dark one.” Sakura dared another step. He didn’t flinch.Sakura swallowed, tasting cotton all down her throat as he watched her with eyes that never blinked and never wavered. “I’m too soft to survived in the world as it is. I must be made new.” 

“Some would argue that is not the wisest of choices.”

“It’s hardly a choice at this point.”

“You always have a choice,” he replied with the first hints or ire salting his tone. 

Sakura din’t look down and she didn’t cower. “ _I_ do, but there are others who don’t, and if I have to change so they have their own voice then so be it. I’ve been soft long enough. It’s time I grow up.” 

His chin tilted upwards and he watched her, unspeaking until the mists at his ankles swelled and engulfed him enterally before dissipating just as fast. He unfolded out of a new cloud mere meters from her, standing on nothing but empty air. 

“You make this bargain and there is no turning back. You share the burden and the yoke of my discipleship. You do not know its weight and you can not know its cost, yet you still seek it?” 

Somewhere far off the whale fish moaned, singing their song to one another in deep and mournful notes. 

“I have nothing and no one to cling to but you. I am no one but the one who sits at your feet,” Sakura vowed, knowing the ancient words in spite of the warnings. Kakashi’s concern was a thorn in her heart but she knew how to grow callouses around the things that hurt her. 

Sakura knelt with both of her hands flat on the stone. She closed her eyes and bowed her head.

“You will have no friends,” he whispered, sounding closer than before.

“Then let me cling to you.”

He touched her face, sliding his hand under her chin to tilt it back. So close she could see herself reflected in his eyes like black mirrors. She looked so small and dirty and young in his eyes. What was there that he saw as worthy? He was a god of the wilds and she was a mortal without even a name to cling to anymore. Her tears slipped free and his hand moved to touch one. His fingers traced the trail up to her eye and pulled away to suck her tear from his finger.

“You are full of salt.” 

“I’m empty of everything else,” she laughed, sounding pathetic in her own ears. “What will you do?” 

“I’ve not had a disciple in such a long while,” he replied. "I can't ever remember taking one on by choice."

“Weren’t you lonely?”

“I know no such thing.” 

“Of course.” Maybe she was foolish to ask him such a question, but it seemed so natural. 

He stared down at his hand and then at the tear trails on her face and then drew back his hand. Mist swirled up thick around him. His edges blurred.The whale fish moaned far off behind him, and there was a note of thunder even further back. 

“What would you seek from me, that I might make you mine and join you into the fold of my covenant? Speak your ambitions and make them known.”

Kakashi had asked her the same thing only days ago. Days ago when they had the first opportunity to bed down somewhere dark and safe and talk without the worry of someone overhearing them and turning them in to the first set of ears that could carry a whisper. He had asked her if she was alright, if she was hurt anywhere, and it took forever to convince him she was fine. Cuts and scratches weren’t on her radar.

But then he had asked her what she wanted to do. She wanted to get somewhere safe and he agreed that was important, but not impossible. There would be days that came after she got the safety she wanted. What would she want after that?

The guilt ate at her and she closed her eyes to answer because she knew she wouldn’t be able to stand the look on his face. 

“I want to balance the scales again. I need to take that man off the throne. There will be no peace for the refugees if he has his way.”

When Sakura looked up at the god from the void she forced the same words out. “Please give me your power so that I might make low my enemies. It is my right.” 

“Lambs were not made for war.”

“Make me something else then.”

So he did. 

He reached for her face again and pulled her to him. Sakura followed his pull without resistance and grabbed for the front of his cloak as he bent his face down to her and fit his mouth over hers. She felt cold all over and there was the taste of winter on his breath, and then the tang of salt. She closed her eye and nearly melted for him as another hand reached up to cradle her skull through the kiss. 

Her whole body burned with frostbite and then she pulled back sharply as something ripped across her chest. She staggered back, hands holding the space just above her breast as a dark mark turned the skin black with bleeding that spilled down over her breasts. Sakura clawed the rest of her shirt away to see the symbol at the end of her necklace shattered and its likeness carved onto her chest. 

He leaned down at touched the mark and Sakura flinched. It was sore and tender and still wet with her own blood. She forced her eyes to watch. He trailed his fingers through the blood and then he reached for his cloak to drag through the blood, wiping it away, which was an odd thing to do she thought. 

“I feel funny.”

“You should,” he hummed.

Sakura blinked, squeezing her eyes before opening them wide. The world shifted and then settled, seemingly making more sense than it had when she first woke up. The vertigo at the back of her head was gone and the weird warping of gravity seemed more natural than odd. She felt…at home in the void. 

“What did that do?”

“I gave you a part of myself.”

Sakura blinked, not knowing what that meant for a god. Any human who told her the same thing would be crazy, but she had to remember he wasn’t human. 

“How?” 

“I take disciples so rarely for this reason. You are a part of me and I am a part of you. There is nowhere you may go where I can’t follow. You will always be mine, unto death and then beyond that.”

“And you will always be mine?” Sakura asked.

“…Yes. Always. This is the promise of a god.”

“Then I will call you as mine.” 

Sakura reached up for his face and pulled him back so they were level and close enough to see the reflection in each others eyes. She stepped up onto the air and gravity lessened around her. Her hair, one a mess in an off the shoulder braid, drifted free around her face. Her eyes turned black like his as she swelled with new magic .

“Itachi.” 

 


	2. Slice his throat with a rusty cleaver

The children at the docks were singing again, and Sakura crouched low in the shadows of a forgotten buildings overhang. They sang of a drunken whaler and then were chased off by the hungover men who staggered out from the taverns. The children laughed louder and scurried into the places where they wouldn’t be touched but still heard. They sang louder and only shut up when someone broke down enough to throw their copper pieces at them. The coin sent them running home and the sight made Sakura smile in spite of everything. 

_Slice his throat with a rusty cleaver, early in the mourning_

The morning was dull but bright enough to see by and she was still stained with blood all over her front. The cloth over her mouth was especially damp but she didn’t dare remove it until she was safe inside. 

She found the window that never creaked and made herself small enough to slip in. She touched down onto a broken walkway that went nowhere inside a decommissioned whaler’s yard house. The troths where whale fish were pulled in and cut apart were still dark with old, old blood that would never wash out. 

Sakura glanced across the open way to the opposite side of the building where a sturdier walkway led to a stairwell out of sight. She extended her left hand and darkness dripped from her fingertips before it hardened into a claw. She pushed her power into it and the claw shot out faster than lightning to grab the railing. Feeling the hold in her flesh and bone fingers, Sakura jumped and her shadow arm snapped her across the open way. 

Sakura walked down the stairs and into the manager’s office, knowing who would still be up waiting for her. Pushing on the door she waited until it finished swinging open before stepping forward. Kakashi shot up out of his seat and crossed the distance to her, stopping just short of being able to reach and touch her. 

“The blood….?”

“Not mine,” she explained before pulling out the short sword from her belt. It was clean at least. 

Kakashi took it from her and set it on the nearest table before accepting the pistol and chain she used to keep it attached to her belt. Then he accepted the heavy military jacket that had once been enough to blend into the local battalion. It was dark with blood but also ripped and torn in places that made him pause.

Turning the jacket over he poked a finger through the holes in her back. They were stained red around the edges. Sakura rolled her eyes and yanked the kerchief off her face before flinging it at him. 

“It’s nothing that lasted. I’m fine now.”

“Is that why you were late?” he asked, folding her items carefully over his arm.

“I was being careful, like you taught me.”

Kakashi poked one of the bullet holes. “Not careful enough.”

“There were a number of traps I just wasn’t clever enough to maneuver around.”

Kakashi scoffed, making her grimace. “You mean you weren’t patient enough to wait them out. You’re plenty clever, but not the best at waiting.” 

“He’s a snake. Every time I think I have him,” Sakura spoke holding up her hand and spreading her fingers wide enough to imitate a net, “he slips away and I’m left with nothing but another chase to wear myself out with. And while I’m hunting he’s building up the army with those terrible things.”

Kakashi took her pistol and turned it over before opening the cartridge and unloading it. He would clean it later and return it to her fully loaded. Ten years ago guns had never been so small or so safe, but now plenty of people were dead to prove a point. 

“Should I expect to hear about this in the papers then?” he asked.

“I doubt it,” Sakura scoffed while yanking at the buckles on her stiff undervest that was just as dirty and bloody as the outer jacket. “He’s a lush but he’s still alive. I told you I wasn’t killing these guys if I could help it.”

Kakashi watched her a moment longer before averting his eyes. “How did you manage that?” 

“He’s been neutralized. An invention he had been using on his rivals was left behind in his workshop. I dragged him back and strapped him in. His brain is cooked. He’ll be useless in that state.”

“And your uncle’s court?”

Sakura shrugged. “They’ll cover it up or kill him for it. Maybe if he has enough smarts left he’ll run away. I gave him his life, but I can’t forgive him enough for anything else.”

Sakura reached down and tugged the thigh high boots off, one by one, and then tossed them into the corner. Kakashi chased them down and collected them as well along with her vest. He didn’t turn around to watch her as she padded off in her undershirt, bare feet, and little else. She missed the way his ears burned above his face mask.

From her toes to her thighs she was bare, but there were bandages that covered her chest up to her shoulders, crossing over enough to hide the mark underneath. Those bandages never came off in front of others.

Connected to the room was a side hallway that split off in two directions; the first being a bathroom and the second being a sleeping room. Sakura turned into the bathroom and shut the door behind her before twisting on the water faucet. Once she was alone she pulled the rest of her things off and dropped them by her ankles. 

There was a mirror broken into three pieces that hung on the wall, stuck inside it’s frame and missing a sliver between the breaks. Sakura watched herself rub at the mark, frowning when she felt nothing from it. 

In the mirror she saw her eyes bleed black and then the world changed. She blinked and saw through the walls, through all the solid surfaces around her. Metals held a faint glow and living bodies were colored in the shade of their blood. Through the walls she could see Kakashi putting her things away. He looked like a glowing red outline of himself. He was taking what was soiled down to where he could wash and dry them. 

She blinked and the darkness left her eyes, seeping out of the edges and following the direction of her lashes.

“You didn’t kill him.”

Sakura almost jumped but didn’t. Itachi only ever showed up when she least expected it, and naked in front of a broken bathroom mirror felt like the perfect awkward situation for him to insert himself. 

“No, Itachi, I didn’t. Is there something else you want to ask me?” Sakura asked, watching him in the mirror shards without turning around. He stood behind her, watching the tub fill with warm water. He never watched her directly, or if he did it was only when she wasn’t looking. It almost made her think he wasn't satisfied with her, but she pushed that thought off. 

“Why? You sought justice. He is worthy of death.”

“It’s too easy for men like him. He’s dead and that’s it. What about facing the fruit of his own tortures? He did terrible things to children and men alike, all in the name of progress, with the ends justifying the means every time.”

“He still deserved to die.” Itachi stared up slowly from the water, still refusing to turn and face her. “You know that.”

“Maybe so, but it is not going to be my hands that soak the world with his blood. I’ll kill if I have to, and you know that’s happened before, but there is almost always another way.”

“You’ll never claw your way back to the throne like that.”

Sakura bit her lip. “It’s only a matter of time before I’m able to infiltrate the Monarch Grounds. I’m able to hold the shadows so much longer. I walked through half his mansion before I needed to materialize again!” 

Sakura turned and before she was all the way around her edges blurred and she became a patch of darkness barely in the shape of a girl. 

Itachi turned to her and reached out. The moment his hand came close enough her hold on the power shuddered and dispersed, leaving her in the flesh with his hand right above her heart, palm spread across his mark on her chest.

His eyes pinned her in place, clear as black glass and just as eerie. “You have grown these past few months. You are eager for success.”

Sakura reached up and crossed her arms over her front, stepping away from Itachi and his touch. Even with the distance she felt his heat. “Why are you here this time? You’ve spared enough niceties. What do you wish of me?” 

“I came to talk with you.”

“For what purpose?” 

He stared back at the tub as the waters rose. When she made a note of disappointment he reached over to turn the handle and cut off the flow. The waters stilled and he watched himself there. 

“You are my disciple. Do not think gods do not have the capacity for joy. You should know that I take pride in your work. I am glad for your success. Tell me more about the man you incapacitated.”

“Don’t you already know?” Sakura asked, crouching down.

“I want to hear it from you.”

Sakura glanced up at the dirty ceiling and sighed. “Fine, but now isn’t really the best time."

Itachi frowned. "You know I can not manifest in the flesh for long, and that is all contingent on your use of my gifts."

"Fine," Sakura huffed. "As long as you don't mind. I’m going to clean myself and then sleep for a long, long time. I don’t know if I have the energy to make it sound exciting.”

Itachi turned around so that his back was to her and Sakura was surprised by his consideration, but not surprised enough to be still. She slipped into the waters and watched as blood, dirt, and sweat flaked off her body. She took a rag to rub up and down her arms and over her body until the skin was red and agitated but clean.

“I’d be content with the sound of your voice,” Itachi finally admitted. “It’s been a while since we last talked.”

Sakura remembered the sad expression and lonely eyes that reflected like black mirrors. Back when they first made their covenant with blood and sealed it with kisses, he had seemed so cold, like something carved from stone.

_“Weren’t you lonely?”_

_“I know no such thing_.” 

“I had a lead from one of the ship hands who ran deliveries for the guy,” Sakura began, sinking further into the tub until he waters lapped at her ears. Itachi didn’t turn, but she saw him lean towards her, sensitive to the sound of her voice.

She told him the details of her latest mission, as well as the details of her failed missions leading up to her final victory. She shared with him her frustrations and disappointments, and when he asked her questions she answered as best she could. He was quiet and attentive for the most part, and never interrupted her. 

His questions were unusual in their commonality. ‘How did you feel when that happened?’ or ‘why did you do it that way?’ He asked questions about her and her state of mind at the time. He didn’t seem interested in hearing about the scientist’s theories or inventions when that was all anyone else could seem to think about.

Eventually Sakura felt clean enough to emerge and pull a towel tight around her. A basket by the sink had clean things in it that she pulled out. She decided she was going to wrap up her mark first with bandages before slipping into a long gray nightshirt that split up the sides to her knees. 

When she reached for the door Itachi stood suddenly. 

“What, you not coming?” she asked. 

She turned back to see his expression but there was nothing but empty space where once a quiet god sat listening to her stories.She listened for a moment more, straining to hear any signs of him hiding elsewhere, but all was still.

Sakura emerged from the bathroom and only paused in her preparations when Kakashi knocked his knuckles against the door. She grunted and he took that as sign enough for him to duck in. 

“I heard…voices,” he said, glancing about.

“Communion.” Sakura didn’t turn around but slapped at the front of her chest where her mark was covered in bandages. “Don’t pay it any mind.”

“He’s been awfully talkative this month.”

“I’ve done more deeds this moth and shed more blood. It’s only natural.” Finally she turned to face him. “What else are you here for?”

“Our _friend_ is stopping by later today. I got his message. Should I wake you when he arrives?”

Sakura made a face. “Of course. You always do.” 

“Alright then. Get your sleep.”

Kakashi grabbed for the door and eased it shut behind him, but Sakura didn’t miss how his eyes strayed around her room, roving for something out of place like the way a worried father inspected a new environment for his child to play in. 

Sakura climbed into bed, clean and barely dressed, and slept until the first blush of dusk colored the sky.

* * *

 

She didn’t dream anymore, but that was a blessing. After the massacre all her dreams had been horrors that twisted into her subconscious and chased her into her waking hours. For days she had seen blood in the shadows and turned to look behind her when she thought she saw a body swinging, only to find the absence of her imagination. After she took Itachi’s mark, the day time hallucinations stopped, and every sleep was blissfully blank. 

She heard Kakashi outside her door and sat up in bed, eyes bleeding black with power. She could see through the walls all the way down to the ground floor and there she saw a new red body pacing back and forth. She recognized the form and crawled out of her covers before Kakashi could reach her door.

She draped a long silk robe over her shoulders and slipped her arms through as the black bled out of her eyes. Kakashi sighed when she met him in the doorway, already used to her preemptively reacting to the situation. 

“You could get dressed,” he offered.

Sakura brushed past him without a word. On one of the tables there was a bottle of red wine and bread on the cutting board. She took the bottle with her and picked up a pair of cups on the way out. 

“Or you could eat,” he sighed, sounding too tired to mention it again. 

He wouldn’t. They could travel to the ends of the earth, as far away from the throne as humanly possible, and he’d still bow his head to her and follow in her shadows like she was the empress of all the walled countries under the sun. 

Sakura descended the stairwell with her robe trailing down the steps behind her. She didn’t stop when Yamato saw her but shook the bottle then the cups. He approached her before she could drop off the last step and took both of the cups from her hands.

“You’re eager, aren’t you?” she teased. Sakura bit at the cork and pulled it free before pouring a cup for each of them. 

“I could say the same for you. You’ve been back a month and look at all the chaos you’ve reaped. I can scarcely keep up with you.”

“What about the old man? Can he keep up with my bloody hands?” Sakura asked.

Yamato offered her one of the cups to take and once it was in her hand he clicked the edge to hers. Sakura tipped her cup into a short salute and then drank a mouthful. 

“He’s managing as best he can but he never had the information network your father had.”

“That’s always been the case. I’m glad to hear he hasn’t been able to adapt.”

“He’s trying. There are others he is relying on. His old students for example…”

Sakura grimaced. “All of them?”

Yamato took another long gulp before turning up his empty cup for a refill. “No, just the one. But that one is enough. I heard you ran into one of his best engineers last night.”

Sakura poured another drink, still on the last step of the stairwell. “How are they handling _his_ situation?”

“They’re wasting time trying to reverse the process. Ibiki had been close to developing something new and the whole court is upset about not being able to play with it.” Yamato grinned at his reflection in the cup. “You didn’t happen to find anything fancy while you were there, did you?”

“There were plenty of fancy toys, but nothing that looked like a weapon I hadn’t seen before. If he was in the development stages of something he hid his work too well.” Sakura waited until he had another mouthful of wine before asking anything else. “What else are you here to tell me?”

“You don’t want these to just be helpful little updates where I encourage you to keep up the good work?” he joked.

“We’ve already gotten to that part. Now the business part please.”

“I don’t know if I’ve had enough to drink for that.” 

He pushed his cup forward again but Sakura didn’t fill it. She tipped the bottle back, touching the rim to her lips. With her dark lashes lowered, she let the dark wine spill directly into her mouth, watching him the whole time. 

Yamato sighed and dropped his hand. “You’re as eager as ever. It’s not another target to take down, but something I think you would be interested in.”

Sakura lowered the wine bottle but kept it at her lips. 

“They’re shipping the refugees out of the Krake ports tomorrow. The charter lists four ships.”

“And?” Sakura lifted a single brow.

“Their destination is listed as the Pelican Mark Islands.”

“Those islands are barely big enough to stand on.” Sakura felt her anger burn as realization came to her. “It’s a dumping trip.” 

“More or less. I thought you might be interested in paying the ship yard a visit. It’s not the sort of business you’ve been busy with lately, but there aren’t many others who would fare as well as you if I shared this with them.” 

Wordlessly Sakura reached over and poured the rest of the wine into his cup. 

-

_“What do you we do with a drunken whaler?”_

A day later and twenty miles south along the cost where the coves made ports ideal for merchants and privateers alike, Sakura sat in the shadows and peeled her oranges. She had shared several with the children who approached her, but kept enough in a sack at her side to keep her busy for a while. The rats came up and rushed away with the peels, brave enough to skitter under her heels. 

_“Weigh heigh, and up she rises. Weigh heigh, and up she rises. Weigh heigh, and up she rises, early in the mourning…_.”

Dusk wasn’t far off and the first of the four ships was being loaded in a painfully slow, drawn out process. The men at the planks made a show of checking passports and documents before pushing the refugees into the right direction. 

Sakura waited until the second and third ship came into port before standing up and leaving her spot to head down a nearby alleyway. 

The other two ships were boarded much more quickly, and the passengers treated just as harshly. The fourth ship never arrived but that wasn’t unusual for a plan put together at the last minute.

The kids kept singingas the world grew dim and the night lanterns lit. Leaving port in the dark was only for smugglers and fools, but the first ship pulled away, slow and easy.

“ _Stuff him in a sack and throw him over, stuff him in a sack and throw him over. Stuff him in a sack and throw him over, early in the mourning…_ ”

Sakura extended her hand and felt the shadows turn her fingers into claws and her arm into an impossible reach. The claw shot forward and grasped the edge of the foremast. She blended into shadow and warped through the air, appearing where she meant to. Before anyone could notice her presence she drew the shadows around her and stalked down the side of the mast. She followed the lines until she was on the side of the ship, crawling over the figurehead and then the forepeak before the shadows slipped off her.

From her perch she watched, waiting for the opportunity to come to her. At the mouth of the cove there were military checkmarks each of the ships would have to pass by.Once they were close enough she could start to move.

Sakura used her ability to reach with her shadows for a new peach and cloaked herself once more before touching down and scurrying out across the deck. All but invisible she ran around the sailors, touching each with a hand cloaked in darkness. Where she touched, a black stain turned into a thread that connected one sailor to the next. She connected five different men together before the felt the strain that told her it was time to stop. She was at her limit.

_ 'For now, but you will grow...soon.' _

Sakura tied it off on one last man and then pulled out her blade. The shadows fell away in time for him to see her hand coming down with the hilt of the sword. The man fell unconscious instantly and the domino hex took his pain and echoed it for all the other men linked by her shadow string. They fell down one right after the other, solidly asleep and incapacitated. 

Sakura conjured a doppelgänger of herself, made out of shadows, and sent her off down the opposite hatch to look for the captain while she headed down into the hold. She’d check in on the passengers and use their help to-.

Sakura froze on the stairs, recognizing the fresh stench. There was a lantern turned low near her head. Sakura pulled it down and let her eyes turn gray with night vision. 

Her stomach swooped at the sight.

All the living breathing refugees that had displayed their passports and presented their pages for inspection had been rounded up into the main cargo hold. She forced herself to look closer and choked when she confirmed the horror of it. 

There were over two hundred people in the hold and all of them were bleeding out the last of their fluids. Her eyes went from gray to black and she swept the whole ship, finding only four more living bodies up above. 

Sakura left her doppelgänger behind with instructions before using her far reach to pull herself onto the next ship where the same sad sight greeted her. She split herself again and left the second doppelgänger behind while she clawed her way back tot he third ship. 

This time she didn’t bother with stealth. She touched down in a show of swirling darkness that unfolded from her body like a pair of wings before dissipating. Men rushed up with their swords and pistols but Sakura was faster. She cast her domino net wide, trapping everyone in sight before running the nearest sailor through with her short sword. He choked on his blood and the rest of the sailors fell to the deck on their knees, gurgling out their last regrets. 

She felt her mark burn, and something like warm hands encircled her wrists as she swung, wild and unbothered until something fell open under her blade. Her eyes were seeping black mist as she ran down to the lowest levels. There were bodies alive still. There were red colors through the walls she recognized as life signs. 

Itachi’s voice was in her head, pushing her on. “ _Feed him to the hungry rats for dinner, feed him to the hungry rats for dinner. Feed him to the hungry rats for dinner early in the mourning_.”

Sakura burst through the last door and let the black fall from her eyes, only to realize in horror all the living bodies left in the hold were armed and facing her. 

“It’s a trap but they don’t know how terrifying you can be,” Itachi whispered into her ears, so close she could feel his breath on her skin. He almost sounded tender, but there was still too much anger trapped in her to tell. “Teach them their lesson my dark cleric.”

Sakura screamed and unleashed herself. 

“ _Shoot him through the heart with a loaded pistol, shoot him through the heart with a loaded pistol. Shoot him through the heart with a loaded pistol, early in the mourning_.”

The gunfire made the room flash around her. Sakura felt the impact along her body, but the shadows were thickest around her wounds to erase them, saving her skin while her overcoat suffering the brunt of it. Kakashi would probably worry, but there was nothing he could do to her that would work. She was Itachi’s chosen, the disciple of the wild god, the follower of the horror from the abyss. 

Sakura didn’t think to spare any of them, butdrenched the walls and floorboards with blood until their bodies were finally shredded and unless. She screamed over their corpses until her legs gave out and she was forced to take a knee. 

Itachi was behind her, physically manifested and solid enough to hold her in his arms. She fell against him, still sobbing while he sang. She felt his hands on her stomach, rubbing over her skin like a mother would with a sick child. She realized, dully, that she was on her side and there was vomit not far from her mouth. 

Itachi pulled her away from it, into his arms as he sang into her ear. He sounded pleased, more so than any other time in memory, and she felt her mark burn hot for him as the words floated up around them. 

_“Slice his throat with a rusty cleaver, slice his throat with a rusty cleaver. Slice his throat with a rusty cleaver, early in the mourning. Weigh heigh, and up she rises. Weigh heigh, and up she rises. Weigh heigh, and up she rises, early in the mourning…_.”

 


	3. The Mother

Itachi's mark spread out across her chest, creeping up the front of her neck first, and then its sides. When she looked at herself in a mirror she could see the shadows of its intended growth, waiting for the time when it would darken her flesh. It mutated the more blood she spilled and the more lives she took. The resolve she had started off with had run its course, and after the disaster in the harbor, each of her missions ended either with a rolling head or a drained body. 

“Are you worried for me?” Sakura teased over the rim of her nearly drained glass.

Kakashi shook his head but took the bottle out of her hand, avoiding her eyes. 

“You sure?” Sakura slurred. “You don’t want to warn me off or tell me to do better?”

“No. I told you this was your choice. I’ll follow you regardless of what you choose.”

Sakura looked into her glass and turned it up, draining what was left of the bitter wine into her mouth. “You’re not smart enough to abandon me?”

“Never.”

Sakura looked up, but past Kakashi there was something else that caught her eye. She groaned and dropped her head onto the table. The ' _thunk'_ sound her skull made caused Kakashi to flinch, but she didn’t care. 

“I need to go,” she sighed. With a great show of effort Sakura lifted her head off the table and stood. 

Kakashi didn’t stop her, but turned to watch her go. “Where are you heading?”

“To the roof,” she called back over her shoulder. She heard him gathering up her half eaten dinner and empty wineglass. She felt bad for wasting their food, but she didn't have the stomach for solid foods like she used to. 

“The roof? What for?” Kakashi asked, calling up to her. 

“Communion.” 

Itachi was waiting for her in front of his alter. He frowned at her disheveled appearance, but didn’t comment on it. 

“You in need of worship my lord?” Sakura sighed, squeezing her eyes to the dull light that filtered down through the clouds. It was a gray, overcast evening. 

“Not as you know it, no,” Itachi answered. He swept his hand and gestured to the streets below him. “I am sated with the fear you sow in my name. You are a devil the people fear to sin against and I am made all the more whole for it.”

Sakura sobered only slightly. It was more her melancholy that made her loose than the actual alcohol. There was something off about Itachi she felt she needed to be awake for. She stuffed her hands into her jacket pockets and stood up next to him.

“That pleases you?” she asked. When he looked to her she elaborated. “It pleases you when the people fear me? Do you like being more ‘whole’ or whatever it is?”

“I do take delight in it, yes, but that was never my intention when we struck our bargain.”

Itachi turned to watch her and his eyes were like black mirrors that swallowed her up. He reached for her face and pulled her close, tugging on her jaw with his thumb and forefinger. She let him, oddly comfortable with the chill of his touch. He made himself soft for her. The darkness in his eyes paled and Sakura was able to see the faintest outline of his actual pupil and iris in each. 

“You’re going to talk about your intentions then?” Sakura guessed, unbothered by their proximity. 

Itachi almost let her go but instead he spoke and his voice was little more than a whisper to be lost in the space between their faces. “I am a jealous god. I want you to look at me, think of me, and worship only me.” She felt his fingers tremble against her as he spoke.

“I don’t have anyone else to worship in this life.”

"Who do you look to?"

Sakura almost didn't understand his question, but there was a feeling in her heart she responded to. "I look to my enemies you deliver unto me. I look to the country I must retake. I look to you for all else."

"Me?" he echoed, as if he doubted her. His eyes never seemed more human then in that moment and she dared not look away or return the stare with anything less then steadfast attention. 

"Only you," she clarified. 

“Then-” 

Itachi let the word hang between them, the beginning of an unfinished sentence before a new thought seized him. He pulled her close and erased the rest of the distance with his lips, fitting them over hers. 

Sakura gasped and then melted into his arms as he drew her to him, warmer than ever before. Like it was second nature, she slipped her hands up into his hair and tangled her fingers in the long strands. Her nails scratched at his skull as she pulled him closer and he obliged gladly. 

“You,” she gasped feeling the heat from her mark burn hot as his hands pulled at her hips. 

His fingers were cool as they slipped up under her shirt to splay across the skin there. His touch didn’t wander much farther but it didn’t have to. She trembled, feeling the strength in her legs slacken. 

“Mine,” he breathed into her mouth when she pulled back to breath. “Give yourself to vengeance in the daylight, but all the shadows and all the dark places know where your heart is truly home. After all your enemies are dead and drained, you will still belong to me. You are _mine_.”

His lips slipped off hers and trailed a path down her jaw to the first tips of his mark, black and dark under her skin. He kissed her there and Sakura felt lightning under her skin. It was pure power that would have ripped her apart if not for his mercy. 

And in the overwhelming madness of that moment Sakura managed a single word. 

“Why?” 

Itachi reached with both of his hands to cradle the sides of her neck, tracing the pattern of his mark with his thumbs. His fingers trailed low and tugged away the front of her shirt to see even more of the dark lines. 

“You already know the answer to that. You were the one who found me first.” 

Sakura let him tug more of the bandages away so that her mark was mostly uncovered by the time he pulled away to marvel at its progress. The stronger she got the thicker the marks grew to accommodate all the power she channeled. Like a river swelling with new water, so too did her marks swell. He had explained to her once before that his brand would never completely fade, but if she ever stopped using it the extensions would all fade back and it would look as it once did when their bargain was first struck.

“You don’t care that I’m using your power to tip the scales?” Sakura asked. “I’ve killed so many and I don’t know how many more I need to-to…”

He chuckled. “Something so trivial doesn’t matter to me.” 

“Shouldn’t it?”

“Understand the nature of the abyss. It is the grand destination of us all. It is our unmaking and it is our beginning. Nothing truly ends in this world. I have no tears to weep for them.” He tapped at her chest. “But I would weep if you were unmade. Do not die on me.”

“I’ve no plans to do that. I still need to kill the old man.” 

“And then?” 

Sakura felt a chill as an image floated behind her eyes. The bodies of all the refugees lay tangled upon mounds before her, still leaking from their slit throats. She could smell their death in the air and knew their ghosts were heavy in the air she breathed. She saw the bodies of her family, each one hanging from a rope dyed dark red. The old and the young all hung together on that tree. 

Itachi's hands tracing patterns over her stomach brought her back to the moment. 

“Then... then I move in and take what was rightfully mine. I rule these islands and the countries north of the sea the way my mother wished me to. My father was no saint, but the king on the throne is a monster I will see killed for all his crimes.” 

“You will rule these lands as Empress,” Itachi hummed. “Such a lofty ambition.”

“You would think so, but as a child it was the one thing I dreaded more than anything. The girl I used to be would have never stopped to turn back and fight for the throne. When it was practically given to me I refused it staunchly.”

“But that is not who you are.”

Sakura returned her hands to her pockets, pulling away. Itachi let her. “Ruling brings me no joy, but the innocents will suffer if I do nothing. My Uncle has no love or room to spare the immigrants and refugees. You saw what he did on the ships.”

“The title of empress will come with its own dangers and risks.”

“Any throne worth sitting in would, I should think.”

"You will never have peace for yourself."

"Maybe not. But I can win it for those who can't make peace with their own hands."

"You are such a pure creature soaked in blood. You will be greatly loved once the sun rises on your throne."

Itachi hummed then reached for her again, grabbing the back of her skull to turn her towards him. She moved in his direction and he kissed her forehead before melting into the shadows. A feeling lingered in his absence she puzzled through.

Dusk painted the sky a faded pink and she slipped back into the stairwell, leaving the roof behind but taking Itachi’s words into her heart. 

‘Do not forget I am a jealous god….’

-

Sakura’s lust for blood slackened and her resolved tired. It was enough to make her messy and she stumbled home with the consequences of her choices staining the front of her shirt and leaking through the outer coat as well. 

Kakashi swore as he helped her into the bath. He stripped off her ruined things and cut through her bandages to get to the wound that looked red and angry. The skin between her breasts down to her navel was cut. It wasn’t a wide wound, nor a terribly deep one. The main problem was the amount of blood she lost. The wound wasn't clotting.  

Sakura felt fuzz in her head and closed her eyes, too tired to watch the world spin around her. She could hear Kakashi working frantically to stop the bleeding with pressure and bandages. She knew she would need stitches. 

“Why aren’t you healing from this?” he asked in a tight tone of voice. 

“It was a-radiant weapon. It cut through his power. They got smart. I didn’t know better.” Sakura rolled her head to the side and managed to get one eye open. “Sorry.”

Kakashi was frantic and she saw how his hands up to his elbows were red from her blood. So much blood....

“Don’t apologize to me, just shut up and hold on. I’ll fix this.” 

Sakura grunted and let her eyelids fall shut once more. She was awake and aware of Kakashi’s hands over her chest, patching up her wound and stuffing the gauze into place to keep the bleeding at a minimum. The room stunk first from her own bloodstains and then from the medical sprites he poured over the wound. Sakura hissed and cursed deep in her throat, biting down hard enough to break weaker teeth. 

“Shh, shhhh, it’s fine, you’re okay. Shuuu, shuuu.” Kakashi tried to ease her pain with sweet words, the way he had when she had been far smaller and more prone to accidents. 

“I know,” she managed to ground out, white knuckling through the pain like she always did. 

“I won’t let you die here,” Kakashi promised her. “I won’t let you.”

“Like you could ever tell me what to do,” she breathed, eyes too heavy to keep open. 

“Sakura!”

She wiggled her fingers but her lids were too heavy to keep up, so she let them fall shut even though she wasn’t asleep yet. Kakashi was frantic about sterilizing the wound and preparing it for stitches. She felt the prick of a needle and knew Kakashi was sewing her back together like a ruined piece of shirt.His stitches were the neatest. 

“Don’t fall asleep on me yet,” Kakashi urged her. “I’m saving you.”

She thought she nodded, but her head and hands were heavy and her eyes didn’t open anymore. 

He worked diligently down her front and then before he could finish at her navel she heard him hiss in anger. “Don’t you dare show your face in front of me. Not here and now when she looks like this because of you!”

Sakura didn’t know who he was speaking to, but her mark from Itachi burned and she suspected he was close. She wondered if he was angry with her. He didn’t like the fact that others could see his mark on her, said it was for _his_ eyes only, but with her wound so close to the mark there was no helping it. Maybe he would be a forgiving god.

“Clean the wound of radiance and I can heal it,” Itachi demanded, hovering nearby. He was close, maybe even directly overhead for how clear and loud his voice rang in her ears. 

“I don’t know how to do that. I’m not a magician,” Kakashi snapped. Sakura felt him tug the thread through her skin. “You’ve done enough.” 

“Not enough,” Itachi whispered, voice thin enough to break. “Clean the wound, stop _mutilating_ her.”

Kakashi cursed hotly and then looped the thread back through her for a stronger stitch. “She’s not your property to keep clean. She’s dying and your power is to be blamed.” Kakashi’s voice shook even though his hands were steady. “Leave us.”

Sakura could tell Itachi bristled at the command. Few mortals dared speak back to him with any measure of disrespect. Aside from that, Sakura suspected Itachi had no positive feelings towards Kakashi on account of how close she and he worked while Itachi could only check in periodically. 

Itachi was a god but he was still only god of another realm where he was left confined for seemingly all of time. Apart from his followers using his powers and tethering him to the mortal realm, Itachi would never be able to cross over. Absently, she remembered Itachi didn’t have any other true followers apart from Sakura. 

“You damn her if you defy me here, _creature_ ,” Itachi hissed. “Clean the wound that I might make her whole again or the void will taste you. I will heal her.”

“I’m already doing that.”

“You’re _mutilating_ her.”

“What do you know? You’re not a man who bleeds, you don’t know anything about us.” Kakashi tugged the stitches and then looped back around to knot it at the end, reaching her navel where a scar would always remain. “And you don’t know _anything_ about Sakura. Not really. You don’t deserve her worship or her loyalty and you never will know what it is you have. You are a dark and heartless god. Be gone, scatter before the sight of this heathen.”

If Itachi truly did leave on his own or was banished Sakura wouldn’t ever know. Her brain was filled with cotton and her eyelids were impossible weights. She fell asleep moments later, too lost to understand what the words Kakashi spoke meant after that. 

-

Sakura awoke in one of the cave baths south of the city. The islands were famous for them, but their medicinal uses were a coveted secret when combined with the right ingredients. Kakashi and Sakura were both of well enough lineages to know those secrets, so when she woke up and cracked the wax surface with her elbows she felt better than she have in a long while. She pulled herself up and found the wound free of its stitches and healing nicely. There would be a faint scar, but at least she was alive. 

Sakura climbed free and reached for a robe left hanging nearby for her. She frowned when she saw the sigils on the ceiling and walls. Most of them were harmless, but a few warded against unnamed gods. Itachi wouldn’t be able to follow her into such caves.

Sakura dressed and found Kakashi not too far into another tunnel. He was speaking with one of the clerics who guarded the pools, thanking them for their help. Sakura watched him slip the woman a few coins before pressing his finger to his lips and winked. The woman would have stayed mute for just that smile, but coin was a just extra security.

She waited until Kakashi was alone before coming around the rest of the corner. He stilled when he heard the movement but when he turned back she saw the moment he realized it was her. His shoulders sagged and a soft smile tugged at his lips. He wasn't wearing anything over his face. 

“You made it,” he breathed.

“You thought I wouldn’t?”

“It’s only been two days.”

Sakura touched the scar between her breasts. “I’m sure my uncle can do a lot of terrible things in two days. I’m ready to leave.”

Kakashi frowned, glancing over her figure. “You should soak a little more. You’ll regain your strength in addition to healing your wounds. You’ll need it if you’re planning what I think you are.”

“And that is?”

Kakashi reached inside the front of his vest and pulled out the blood stained envelope she had come back with. Sakura grinned at the sight and Kakashi sighed once more. 

“It’ll be poetic justice,” Sakura explained. 

“It’ll be a nightmare in masks.”

Sakura rolled her eyes. “Everyone knows that a masquerade hosted by the king’s favorite whore is the perfect setting for me to stage a little regicide. He’s _begging_ me for it. How could I pass this up?”

“He knows your weakness now.” 

“I won’t be so sloppy next time,” she countered easily with her own personal air of authority. “Also, what’s with the wards on this place? Half of them block my powers and abilities.”

“It’s the cleric’s idea.” Kakshi pointed to the walls and ceiling around them. “It’s a place of healing so dark gods aren’t exactly welcome. Or did you forget what he was?”

“You mean what I am,” Sakura sighed, looking down at her hand. She tried to summon the darkness over her fingers but it came too slowly to shape, and fell apart across her palm. “He was the god I choose, after all. Whatever he is, so am I.”

“You seem awfully attached to him. I had thought at first when you struck your bargain he would be a means to an end, something you could satisfy with blood and part with amicably. Will you bring him with you onto the throne? Will you build churches to him in the cities next to those for the Mother?” 

 

He challenged her with his tone. Maybe she was a dethroned fugitive without a crown, but she was still his queen in every way but one. He was not her lover or her father, he was not her equal so long as she still believed in her own victory. 

Sakura raised her stare from ankle to eye, dragging her sight up over Kakashi. She inhaled and set her shoulders back with an easy roll. “Why do you speak to me this way?”

She spoke with a voice like winter and Kakashi flinched from it.

Kakashi lowered his eyes as if her stare burned him. “He has endangered you. You...you can break from his mark here before returning. You don’t need his power anymore.” 

"You want me to renounce It-my god here?"

"You could do it and go back to the way things were. That's a choice you have here."  He fumbled with an ivory icon sticking up out of his pocket. Sakura recognized the face of the Mother, a god of forgiveness, healing, and shelter.  

Once upon a time Sakura might have taken up the habit to escape the throne. She didn't hate the idea of being a cleric to the healing Mother if it meant being free from the shadow of authority. That had been her plan once upon a time.

She had shared her dream with Kakashi and he had encouraged it. Sakura remembered when she had been younger and he leant her space in the Hound's Yard to build a crude shrine to the mother. He kept it secret from all others and tended to it when she could not. 

' _You'd make a wonderful cleric. You have the heart for it. I've never met someone so privileged who's still so kind_.'

'You don't want me to be a kind empress for the people-for the good of the empire?'

' _Only if that is what would make you happy.'_  

_ 'Mother says I have a duty.' _

_ 'No, you have a choice.' _

_ 'You're the only one who talks to me like this. When I'm a cleric for the Mother I hope I can still see you like this.' _

Sakura tore her eyes away from the icon. The memories made her voice heavy, but she still held her head up and kept her shoulders back, refusing to falter in posture or spirit. “I’ll always think kindly of the Mother, but she did not give me the sight to see the unseen, the strength or speed of a demon, or the teeth of an animal. She will not help me where I am going and I can understand if you wish to stay in the light.”

Kakashi frowned but didn’t look up. “I’ve come with you this far and swore to see you returned to your throne. I will not abandon you now.” 

Sakura nodded, satisfied. “Very well then. I’ll do as you suggested and soak a bit longer, but when that is done we need to leave. There is much to do before my uncle’s party.”

Kakashi nodded. “I’ve already started writing the letters.”

His comment made her grin. “And here I was thinking you would try to talk me out of it.”

“Would it have worked?” he sighed.

Sakura chuckled, turning her back to him and slipping around the corner out of sight.

“Never.”

 


	4. Mine

Sakura dressed for the night, taking extra care to secure the ruffles around her neck with a ruby the size of her eye. It winked in the light, set atop a brass pin that kept the white folds of her front in place. She tugged on the ends of her vest and then shook out the tails of her coat. Her trousers were tight all the way down to her stiletto boots and just as dark as the rest of her suit. Only the ruby and white of her undershirt and cravat stood out.

Itachi wrapped his arms around her waist and rested his chin on her shoulder, inhaling deeply. His eyes fluttered like butterfly wings as he hummed into her neck. 

“You are most radiant tonight. My jewel suits you.”

Sakura reached down to pat the place where his hands rested over the low part of her stomach. He had been especially tactile ever since she and Kakashi first stepped off the island into the boat chartered for the mainland. 

As soon as he could, Itachi made his mark on her burn hotter than ever before and it almost frightened Sakura. She thought he might be angry with her, but as soon as they were on land he urged her to spirit to the nearest shadows where he could manifest. His whispers became screams in her mind she couldn’t ignore. Sakura had barely managed to finish explaining it to Kakashi when she felt Itachi push the magic into her.

It had scared Kakashi when she _evanesced_ away, but Sakura knew she had to pay her penance some way, even if it wasn’t her fault their connection had been severed.

If he had been angry it wasn’t at her. Once she had slipped into the shadows between two buildings Itachi melted out of the darkest part of the wall and reached for her to fold into his arms. He had nearly crushed her to himself before pulling away just enough to tug open the front of her shirt and inspect the white scar that cut from between her breasts to the tip of her navel. His kiss had been reverent and Sakura still burned at the memory of it. 

“I’m glad you like it,” Sakura whispered, watching the pair of them in the mirror. 

“The jewel isn’t what I like.” His nose brushed the underside of her jaw and she shivered. He had found the first hint of his mark pecking through. It made him purr in pleasure. 

“Tonight will be a pretty big deal for me. It’ll go one of two ways.”

“It will go _one_ way. You will be victorious. You will slaughter your enemies. You will rule this barren land as it’s queen and unite the isles back into an Empire again.” In the mirror Itachi’s eyes flashed red like the ruby at her neck. “This all I have seen.” 

Sakura closed her eyes and swallowed once more. Itachi’s mark burned under her many layers, but not unbearably so. Since her return it had started to grow downwards, following the length of her scar. Soon the whole front of her would be covered in black spiraling marks. 

“What else have you seen?”

Itachi glanced up at her from under her chin and kissed her neck once more, pulling back the ruffles for better access to his mark. “Many things. What do you want to know?”

“Do you want tem-ah-teamples to, in your name? Do you want me to spread your religion in the cities once I am crowned?”

Itachi hummed, pulling his lips back. “No. I am a privet god. In all my ages of existence I have never demanded temples or churches or hoard of followers. I tolerate the cults and ignore the zealots, but I seek to never have more than two in my service. You know of the old ways.”

“There are many old ways.”

Itachi chuckled and then closed his eyes, relaxing on her shoulder. “A god such as I needs only his Bride, and on occasion a Horse to mount and ride into the world of men. Apart from you I have scarcely a foothold outside the void.”

“And is that what you want of me after this? To find you a Horse?”

“No, I am satisfied with what I have now, and entertain no desire to change our arrangement. Do not dwell on my ambitions, for they are meager. Win your victory tonight my zealot, and let me feast on the blood you spill once more.”

Sakura might have said something else but Itachi caught her face in his hand and turned it towards his. He found her lips with his and moved against her, burning hot and hungry. It was enough to make Sakura moan. Her knees shook and he caught her by the waist, bending her slightly before the force over her was only shadow, and he was gone once more. 

Sakura gasped for breath and braced against the mirror. Her reflection was flushed in a way she recognized too well. Stablehand boys and pretty maids looked that way when they slipped out from private rooms and shielded encounters on the palace grounds. Itachi’s mark still burned and Sakura had to fight the pit of heat that coiled in her from spreading further. 

Instead of exiting, Sakura sat down to reapply her makeup and darken her lips with a deeper tint. Finally she slipped on her mask and tied it off. 

Predictably, Kakashi was waiting for her at the base of the staircase. 

They were staying at a fancy inn, upscale enough to host lesser nobles who didn’t have family or friends to stay with when visiting. Kakashi's suit was ash gray with a darker half cape lined with wolf fur dropped over one half of his shoulders, tied underneath the opposite arm. His mask looked like a wolf’s while her’s looked like a black bird’s. 

“Ravishing as always,” he complimented. 

“As are you, my dear,” Sakura played along. 

Kakashi chuckled and dipped his head as they passed underneath the threshold barely tall enough for most men. Outside their carriage waited, doors open and lanterns lit. Sakura slid in first and Kakashi closed the door behind them, knocking on the front facing panels to signal to the driver they were ready to depart. 

And for the next fifteen minutes they sat in comfortable silence across from one another, Sakura with her heels propped up on Kakashi's knees so that he could rub at her ankles through the supple leather. It was the last comfort she would have for the rest of the night, and possibly-it things went poorly-for the rest of her life. 

The carriage arrived at the end of the queue and it moved slowly but steadily towards the front where a footman opened their door and let them out. Kakashi went first and offered her his arm. Taking it, Sakura followed him out and up the front stairs, behind another group of handsome ladies in tailcoats on the arms of their dates. 

Dresses had been out of season for the last forty years, but Sakura spotted one or two rebels in ballgowns cut up the front to show off their trousers underneath. She was glad she didn’t stand out like she first feared she would. 

The New King’s ball was in the early stages, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t in a healthy swing. Sakura and Kakashi slipped in without much noticed and mingled with a pair of inconspicuous attendants who were eager to make small talk about the food and deserts.

_ "Such exotic dishes! We even have basil in the cheese now." _

_ "Our merchants are getting so much more support these days." _

_ "Well where else should our money be going? Nothing else actually helps us directly. Ha!" _

Sakura pretended to laugh and not remember the bodies of refugees 'too expensive' to keep alive. She knew the debate too well to not know where the conversation would end up going. 

Kakashi parted from her before she could say anything damming. He slipped off, leaving her with a encouraging squeeze to her elbow. It was the last bit of strength she needed. Sakura lingered only a breath and then she started to move. 

The party spilled out into four separate ballrooms, with the first two being free for people to flow in and out of. The third room was lightly guarded and no one was stopped, just watched. The fourth, largest and grandest of all the ballrooms was where the people with invitations could go.

Sakura found familiar faces in the second room, but didn’t stop to talk with Iruka her old tutor, or with any of the other lesser ladies and lords of houses in the empire. She saw Sai in the third room and not too far from him she saw Yamato. The two spies mingled flawlessly, utilizing beauty in Sai’s case and charm in Yamato’s to get lords and ladies to spill secrets over the win glasses.

Sakura almost passed on without a word, but then she caught sight of Jiraya chasing a lady in a ballgown, laughing far too loud for a spymaster. 

_ 'If he was in the third room…..' _

Sakura left the room and dipped into one of the side halls, following it down to the least populated servants quarter. There were still a few secrets in the walls she knew how to take advantage of. She found a crack in the stones and pulled it open with her nails before making herself into a shadow that slipped seamlessly inside. 

She sprinted up the stairs that led nowhere and then followed a support beam over the open expanse, keeping herself in her shadow form. If anyone were to look up and see her, their eyes would pass right through her. It freed her up to turn about and look down on the party below. 

Next to his adopted grandfather, Naruto sat looking bored and gloomy. The little prince Konahomaru tried to talk to Naruto and cheer his older friend up, but parties had never been Naruto’s idea of fun if there were people watching him. If he was free to make chaos and pull pranks it was a different story, but they weren’t kids anymore. 

Unable to help herself Sakura crawled like a cat along the edges, keeping to the shadows where no one would notice her. She was still too far away to hear what they said, but she pulled out a monocular and fit it to her left eye to use for reading lips. 

“I’m not in the mood for that,” Naruto said, likely sounding bored if his expression was any indication. 

“You’re always in the mood to dance with a pretty girl.” Konamaru waved at a lady in a cream colored pantsuit who giggled behind a feathered fan and matching mask.

Naruto made a face and turned away. “Not anymore. It’s different.”

“Yeah, you’re _free_ to mingle.”

“I didn’t want to mingle before. I just joked about it.”

“Come on, the old man is trying to be considerate. Try and at least pretend to enjoy the night. People are always watching us now.”

Naruto didn’t say anything but continued to look bored sitting on his short throne. 

Sakura saw a new figure enter from the crowd and grimaced, fixing her monocular on the man in red and purple robes.

“My grandson is right, Naruto. You shouldn’t slouch like that.”

Sarutobi turned his personal guard away with a wave and stopped in front of Naruto’s seat. The clockwork sentinels he had walked in with lingered close. He pat Naruto on the shoulder and turned around to face the crowd, gesturing to it with a wave of his hand. With his face turned Sakura couldn’t read his lips anymore, but had a fair idea what was communicated. 

Konahamaru jumped up first and ran down half the steps. Naruto got up a second later and started a lazy descent. A gaggle of ladies flocked around him the moment he stepped off and one took hold of his arm to drag him into a dance. 

King Sarutobi looked on, seemingly pleased with the display as he took his seat at the highest throne reserved for a once upon Emperor she had called father. Sarutobi rested his wrist under his cheek and watched on, seemingly unconcerned with what might lurk in his shadows. 

Sakura’s mark burned and she felt the thrill of Itachi’s thoughts in her heart.

‘ _You don’t need to hide anymore. You’re more powerful than any of them. Make yourself known. Let me once more feast on the fear you harvest in my name_.’ 

“He killed my father, he killed my mother, he killed my dogs, my brothers, my sister…and then hung their bodies from the Sun Tree for all the city to see,” Sakura whispered back to Itachi, shivering from the images that came back to mind. 

Her father hadn’t been a good man, but he had been a fair Emperor who ruled with just enough justice to reason with. It didn’t matter that he was cold to the rest of the family and delved too deep into his spy net work to bother noticing which of his children had a birthday to celebrate. 

She hadn’t loved him until she lost him, and she didn’t know if she had the right to those feelings, but that didn’t negate the hunger for revenge she slept with each night. Sarutobi had taken everything from her. Her family, her friends, her personal guards in the _Uchiha_ unit…all of them were gone in a single horrific night. 

“Then pay him in kind,” Itachi spoke, managing to manifest for a single moment before he was gone again, unable to linger any longer in her world. 

Someone in the third ballroom set off some cheep sparklers and the lords in the forth ballroom cheered for the sight until their own room turned dark in preparation for a small light display. The pyromancers danced colored sparks into the designs of a red bird, a blue-green dragon, a white tiger and then a myriad of other magical creatures that made even Naruto cheer. 

Sakura watched until a glittering blue whale, larger and longer than all the others, moved through the air. Sakura fell through the display, casting a spell of duplicity on herself just before impacting with the floor. 

Dark shadows reached for her to cushion her fall and she rolled into their embrace, springing up with both swords drawn and ready to cut through the first two clockwork sentinels that sprang to life. Her sword cut the abdominal gears in one and the head off the second. One fell apart while the other sliced at her duplicate. Sakura split again and the third version of herself raced up underneath the sentinel to jam two blades into it’s thigh joints. It tipped and fell just in time for a handful of flesh and body guards to swarm up around her. 

Sakura screamed and turned into shadow again, dropping her swords to adopt the figure of a black tiger that sprang on the closest guard and left him bleeding. She swiped at another and sent him flying then bit off the arm of another. 

“Clerics!” someone screamed.

Sakura grew frantic, doubling her size until she was a small wyvern with a barbed tail that swept the dance floor clean. 

“Fire on it!” 

Sarutobi screamed, running towards the back of the room where there were a number of secret exits. Sakura’s tail tore through the wall and collapsed that rout of escape before she felt her hold on the form waver. She roared and then snapped back into the shape of a girl just in time to avoid a blinding white burst of celestial energy. 

Sakura rolled across the floor and picked up her swords again, snapping them open and twisting back into action. She ran for Sarutobi, advancing on him even as more ray attacks cut through the air, close enough to make her feel their force. 

She dropped her swords and leapt the rest of the way to land atop Sarutobi and knock him down. Hands around his throat she let her eyes go black as dark power rolled off her in whips of smoke, billowing from her shoulders and head. 

Sarutobi screamed and once his mouth was open the dark smoke twisted into him, choking him all the way down. He convulsed and flailed but she was finally on top of him, where she had dreamed of being for months and months. 

“Get off him or the Hound Master dies!”

Sakura looked up, snarling, but dropped Sarutobi the moment she saw who Jiraya had a sword next to. Kakashi looked miserable and was bleeding from his left eye which had been cut open. Sarutobi’s spymaster looked ruffled as well, but not as bad as Kakashi.

“Sakura, don’t-”

Kakashi’s words were cut off when the blade at his neck pressed closer. “ _Quiet_ , you traitor.”

Several of the guard were starting to rouse and the most gossip hungry nobles had begun to trickle back, too curious and too stupid to know any better. Sai and Yamato were nowhere to be seen. Had she been betrayed?

“Drop him,” Jiraya warned, snarling.

Sakura let Sarutobi go, cutting off the blackness that had been spilling into him. She raised her hands, palms sides up and stepped over the limp king’s body. 

“Let him go or I will kill all of you,” Sakura warned, feeling her mark heat under her clothes. 

“We don’t negotiate with assassins.”

Sakura sneered. “No, you just serve one.”

Jiraya flinched and then his eyes narrowed. “Take off your mask…Sakura.”

Sakura heard the gasps and knew it wasn’t worth it to keep the cheep disguise in place. She pulled at the beak and tossed it to the side, letting it clatter across the dance floor. There was a low murmur in the crowd as people began to recognize her. 

Sakura shook her wrist and a thin blade slid into her hand. “I’ll kill your king here and now, so let him go or I swear I’ll finish what I started.”

Kakashi looked out with his one good eye and she saw his lips twist in frustration as she negotiated for his safe release. 

“He’s a murderer and so are you. Bloody as they come, you’re wanted for crimes against the crown.” 

“I am the crown,” Sakura snarled. “Until he stole it!”

“A baseless claim,” Jiraya shouted louder over his shoulder to the lords and ladies. “Our king Sarutobi was only responding in defense of the city Danzo planned to purge with his refugee fighters. Sarutobi had no choice.”

“No choice but to kill children and women in their beds!?” Sakura screeched.

The old spymaster grimaced but didn’t falter. “Women and children grown and strong enough to wield weapons in the halls. They were planning the attack together and we’ve enough witnesses to prove it.” 

“But we don’t.”

The room went still as Sarutobi climbed to his feet, bracing on his knees as he righted himself behind Sakura. 

“Sire?” one of the guards called out, hesitating.

“We killed the old royals in their beds and dressed them up, don’t you remember Jiraya? Why should we lie about it now? We were obviously stronger, and of course we deserved it. We had been planning for years to take back the lands Danzo tainted with foreign blood.” Sarutobi sneered, finally lifting his chin and gazing out at Sakura with his dark eyes. “ _I_ killed Danzo myself.” 

The murmur spread like a roll of ocean waves, spanning out from the fourth ballroom to the rooms beyond. Jiraya looked nervous but Sarutobi didn’t flinch. His black eyes were hard and cruel and most importantly, _honest_. 

“Sire?” another of the guards called out. “You were defending us.”

Sarutobi laughed. “From who? Starving beggars? You’re a fool for believing that. You deserve what happened to you. This land is filled with the weak and the stupid. I will return the countries to prominence. We will be feared yet again.” 

Sarutobi took a step towards Sakura but she backed up, raising her blade. “Don’t make me kill you, old man.”

“Sire,” Jiraya called out, his hold on Kakashi weakening as panic made him sloppy. All his lies and hard work were evaporating with every whisper and comment from the crowd behind him. 

Kakashi didn’t hesitate, but threw off Jiraya’s arm and ran for Sakura. It happened so fast. Sakura turned to reach for him, intending to swallow him up in shadow and pull to safety. Sarutobi moved too, fleeing in the opposite direction, while Jiraya threw his short sword straight into Kakashi’s back.

Sakura screamed and dove for Kakashi, catching him before he could hit the floor. Someone screamed about how Sarutobi was getting away, while someone else argued he was still their king. The soldiers looked lost, too stunned to move in either direction. 

“Kakashi,” Sakura gasped, turning him onto his side and bracing her hand around the blade. She choked on her tears when she saw how deep it bit. “No, no, no-no! You-not you, this wasn’t how this was supposed to go. Why didn’t you _run away_?”

Kakashi coughed blood and it stained the white parts of her shirt. He reached for her, pulling himself closer, one hand braced on her shoulder. “And leave you?” He laughed and it only resulted in more blood falling free. “Never.” 

“You idiot,” she gasped, feeling the tears. “You’re not supposed to leave me like this. You can’t just…leave me alone.” 

She cradled his face, wiping away a smattering of blood with her thumb. Each of his breaths sounded more ragged than the last and she knew he was drowning in his own blood, but there was nothing she could do. Itachi couldn’t heal him with his powers, as they only worked on his chosen.

His chosen…

“Itachi!” she screamed, aching for him with more fear and emotion than before. “Please, oh, come-It-Itachi! Help him, please!”

“He is not one of my chosen,” Itachi answered from beside her. He watched over her shoulder in a cold, detached state as Kakashi shivered out his last breaths. “I can do nothing for the heathen.”

“Please, make him like me. Take him on as your other-the horse or mount you were telling me about. You can do that!”

Itachi turned to face her, eyes black like black mirrors. “He has to consent to that, and he looks in no condition to do so. Even so, I don’t think he could make me an offering so tempting in this state.”

“He doesn’t need to. Kakashi is _mine_ -I make the offering in his steed. I speak on his behalf and offer him up because it is _my will_ ,” Sakura hissed, squeezing Kakashi’s hand as she shuddered. “I will not let him die. I do not allow it.”

Itachi watched her for a moment and for all the steel in her spine and spirit, she almost wilted when he didn’t move. Kakashi’s hand in hers squeezed with the last bit of his strength and Sakura felt the fear deep in her belly when she looked down. 

Kakashi breathed out one last time, and then Itachi’s spirit entered him in a swirl of smoke and flashing red eyes. 

-

The summer made the pavement shimmer as another carriage rumbled past. The dust it kicked up was almost worth the breeze it made for those stuck outside selling goods, but that didn’t keep anyone from coughing.

The pair ducked out of the open road and took a seat together at an eatery specializing in flavored ice. The smaller of the two smiled through her shawl before paying for their meal. With a sigh she let the shawl fall away from her face as she leaned back in her chair. Catching the eye of the man across from her she grinned. 

“The eyepatch suits you,” Sakura teased.

“I’m as dashing as a pirate, don’t you think?” Kakashi chuckled back.

“Easily.”

Their food came and the pair ate greedily, happy to have the sweet treat almost as much as the privacy and freedom that came with sneaking out.

“I almost regret running back into the line of duty,” Sakura sighed around her ice. “Almost.”

“We don’t get away enough,” Kakashi agreed. “It’s only been three months. What do they expect you to get done in that time? Sartutobi had twice as long and did nothing meaningful.”

Sakura scowled, thinking of the mess the former king had left behind in his forceful abdication. After his confession the night of the ball, he had been clapped in irons and taken off to court where he seemed to awake from a dream and sputter about never remembering any of what he had admitted to the rest of the room. Everyone thought him mad after that and Sakura was content to let the old traitor rot away for however many days he had left. 

“How are you feeling today?” he asked.

Sakura startled when she felt his hand reach for herself across the table. It made her smile to feel his fingers brushing up over her knuckles. He was the only one she let touch her so intimately, and she knew she would likely never let anyone else get as close. 

“They’ve been asking me some terrible questions I don’t want to answer,” she admitted at last.

Kakashi frowned at her expression. “That doesn’t sound good. You’re not one to shy away from hard decisions. What are they asking about?”

“Heirs, mostly.”

Kakashi’s fingers stopped tracing her knuckles. He blinked his one good eye and sat up straighter. “Oh,” was all he could manage. 

“Some of the more annoying ones are going on about alliances and opportunity, but it’s not worth the headache. Any noble I marry will end up slighting another house and I’m not ready for that sort of drama.”

“When is anyone?” he weakly joked.

“It’s…one of the reasons I asked you to slip away with me like this,” Sakura admitted. She turned her face away but Kakashi could still see the blush on her ears turning their tips red. 

“My advice?”

“Your answer. Would you…” Sakura turned to face him, determination shored up. “Would you be their father?”

Kakashi almost pulled away from her in shock but she held on. She saw his eyes go wide.

“I don’t want it to be anyone other than you, Kakashi. It-it’s always been you. No one else stood beside me when the world turned against me, save for a god that no longer answers my prayers, and I couldn’t dream of being with anyone else. Please, would you consider it?”

His mouth open and then closed but no sound came out. Sakura squeezed his hand again, tugging nervously at his fingers when he still didn’t speak. Eventually he managed to force the words out. “You want to be with me…? As in…?”

“Technically your title would be Prince, since your rank can not exceed mine, and the empire is still shattered leaving me only queen…but it would be yours if you wanted it.”

“I’m a dog keeper, Sakura.”

“No,” she blurted. “You are my most loyal and trusted companion. I couldn’t deny you this if you were willing.” Sakura squeeze his hand one last time and then let go. “But I understand if the title isn’t something you would be eager for. If-if that’s the case then, would you-um, maybe as a consort… we could be…that?”

Kakashi stared at her a moment more. “You want to be with me,” he echoed dully.

Sakura nodded. “I want it to be you…when I’m ready.” 

Kakashi reached for her hand again, causing her to look up once more. She had been brutal to her enemies, vicious with her oppressors, and steady in the face of far worse fears, but when she looked up at Kakashi she was reduced to something far simpler: a girl with a vunerable heart. 

He lifted her hands to his lips and kissed her knuckles, suddenly fervent in his actions. “Always,” he whispered against her hand. “I am always yours.”

And he was.

\- 

It was a grand affair in spite of Sakura’s wishes, because all royal weddings were grand affairs, but it passed along with the season and so did the peace she had chased so desperately. It was a hard won thing, but with the same determination that helped her survive worse fates, Sakura survived the courts and slowly began rebuilding the old empire into a new golden age, one that welcomed all. Kakashi stood at her side through all of it. 

And much to the delight of the kingdoms, Sakura soon discovered the first signs of her pregnancy setting off a new wave of joy and celebration for the people. It felt a bit much for something she viewed as so mundane, but when Kakashi cried at the news her heart was moved. 

“It’s going to be ours,” he whispered into her navel, holding her close. 

“Yup, that’s how it normally works.”

“Yours and mine,” Kakashi breathed. “I’ve never been a father before.” 

His comment made her laugh. “And I’ve never been a mother before, but it happens. Don’t cry so much. You’ll make me feel weird.”

“I wouldn’t want that,” he laughed, even though there were tears on his cheek, rolling off his chin and seeping out from underneath his eye patch. 

Sakura kissed his head and then urged him to ready for bed. He didn’t let her walk, but carried her there himself, depositing her with the upmost gentleness, undressing her himself with reverent care. And normally she would get annoyed by all the pandering, but it was her husband and he was too happy so she let him have his fun until he was beside her in bed.

“I’m only a few weeks along,” she whispered into his ear before she forced him down and he laughed at her greedy hands roving wild and free. 

And like always, he let her have her way.

Night came to paint their room dark with shadows. A new moon made the sky a tapestry of stars to marvel at, but Kakashi stayed up watching Sakura sleep. Not that she would ever know, but Kakashi didn’t sleep at all-not since he had died that night. 

“Mine,” he breathed, stroking her face with the back of his fingers before leaning down to kiss the crown of her head. 

She didn’t stir so he lowered his lips to her jaw and then to her neck. When she slept on, blissfully exhausted and sound asleep, he pushed the bedsheets back to expose her chest and markings. Almost allof them had faded from disuse, but the original brand was still there, small and easy to miss just above her breasts. She had spent all that magic during the mascaraed to make Kakashi’s covenant.

He leaned down and kissed the mark once, twice, a third time for good measure before pulling back to rest on the pillow next to her. In the dark of the room his two ruby eyes glowed an eerie shade of red. 

There was a glass of water on the nightstand that reflected the unnatural glow of his eyes whenever he manifested more fully in the body of Kakashi. Itachi paid it no mind and turned back instead to his wife asleep on their pillows. He never tired of kissing her in her sleep, and it was probably his favorite idle past time. 

When she slept he allowed his mind to wander. Some nights he wondered if he would tell her, and how would she react to the truth of it all. What would she do if she knew that every kiss, ever sweet word, every night of lovemaking had been with him and not the man she thought of as Kakashi Hakate? Would she run from him, or would she understand? Would she still push him down and demand his obedience in their bed, or would she cower? Would she try to flee from him? Would she still tell him she loved him? 

Maybe one day he would tell her that Kakashi had been beyond saving, and that the master of the hounds had really died that night in the ballroom when she thought a miracle had happened. But Kakashi had been a heathen that sewed her up and denied him access to her holy wounds once before. Itachi was a long lived god but his memory was iron clad. He had not forgotten the insult, nor had he forgiven it. 

Maybe she would understand. She had given herself to him once. She should have known better.

“No matter,” Itachi breathed aloud. He pulled the covers back up and moved closer to her side, sliding a hand down to brush over her belly. The feel of it made him smile, and he imagined it swelling with his child. “You’re mine forever, my love. I told you once before, didn’t I? I am a jealous god.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ta da~  
> There you go. That's it. 
> 
> Fun Fact: That ending could have gone one of two ways. Back when I was still drafting this fic I was conflicted on ending the story this way, or in making Kakashi the Yandere one that, but this is what you get. :D   
> Someone said there wasn't any Yandere Kakashi out there and I felt my heart stir with wanting. I wish I had the energy to do a Yandere series because writing about dark lovers is such a fun thing to do. I'm glad I could get around to writing a Yandere Itachi here. Hopefully it's well received and people like it. 
> 
> A little bit of harmless trivia: There are no dresses in the Dishonored games and I thought that was a fun little detail of world building.

**Author's Note:**

> Well, you saw the tags, don't look so surprised. You're getting a Yandere Itachi. Have fun. I've seen too much fun Yandere art work to not write something like this. 
> 
> The fic is finished I'm just releasing it in spurts as I go back to edit it, so you don't have to worry about reading something that isn't finished. I'm just terrible about editing my stuff and it takes forever.


End file.
